What can you say about a band that says nothing at all but lets their instruments speak their words while their lips are standing still?
When it comes to Scottish five-piece Mogwai, words do little justice to the raging swells and, at times, beautiful melodies swarming like a Category 5 tornado out of the speakers.
Two days off the release of their fifth studio album, Mr.Beast, lead noise maker Stuart Braithwaite and Co. took the stage in Asheville, N.C., at the Orange Peel ready to deliver their own brand of rock.
After a brief introduction from Braithwaite the band immediately launched into “Auto Rock” the beautifully sorrowful piano-driven opening track from Mr.Beast that eventually builds until the guitars swell and pounding drums engulf the piano.
From there Mogwai stampedes into a string of old noise rock favorites “Hunted By A Freak” from 2003’s Happy Songs for Happy People and “Ithica 27-9” until returning to “Travel Is Dangerous,” a plodding guitar driven tune that builds into a gigantic typhoon of sound only to crash down again like a wave hitting shore.
With each song, the members of Mogwai look as if they are pulled into a trance-like state you only see in charismatic Pentecostal churches on the Trinity Broadcasting Network.
For Mogwai, it is as if each reverberation and crescendo is like a backing track to the religious experience it stirs up.
As Mogwai falls deeper into their hypnotic state they go into the hope-filled sweet splendor of “Friend of the Night” only to be blown away by the punishing wall of sound from “Ratts of the Capital.”
Mogwai eventually ends their surprisingly lengthy 12-song set with “We’re Not Here,” the ominous destructive closing track from Mr.Beast. Eventually like all bands Mogwai return for an encore with the charging onslaught of “Glasgow Mega-Snake” and “Mogwai Fear Satan.

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